Authors: James Mallory
In the sudden silence, Frik knew that he had gone too far.
“Unworthy?” Mordred asked in astonishment. He turned to Morgan. “What does that mean, Mother?”
Frik was frozen with terror, staring toward Mab. But oddly, in that moment of crisis, the gnome’s fear was not for himself.
If Mab blasted him out of existence, who would protect Morgan from the others?
Morgan frowned, thinking very hard about Mordred’s question before giving up. “Oh, I’ve forgotten! What does it mean?” she
asked, turning toward Frik.
“Yes, it is unworthy,” Mab said, ignoring Morgan and concentrating on Frik. If he had hoped that their centuries of association
would count for anything with her, he was doomed to disappointment. Mab smiled at him, a faint, almost fond smile.
“But I don’t like to be told, Frik.”
She made no gesture, but suddenly Frik went flying backward to crash into the wall with bruising force. As he slid to the
floor he heard Mordred chuckle with delight—the suffering of others could always make Mordred laugh.
Morgan rushed over to Frik, crying his name. He forced himself to smile at her reassuringly, but his eyes were on Mab, awaiting
his further punishment.
But Frik had nothing more to fear from Mab tonight. The Queen of the Old Ways gazed dotingly at her protégé, while Mordred’s
delighted laughter filled the Great Hall of Tintagel.
All wizards lived in towers, so the folk belief ran, and Merlin was not unhappy to acquiesce to this view of his needs, as
it had gained him a spacious room at the top of the highest tower of the castle, where he could look down on the rooftops
and out over the walls. He spent as much time here as he did in his little hut outside the castle walls, for here, high in
the sky, with the shutters open to the winds that tumbled through his tower, Merlin felt as though he were living among clouds,
not stones. His beloved books filled the shelves, and his desk was filled with letters from correspondents in many lands,
as well as copies of the dispatches sent to the Queen. These days, Merlin was the only one who read them, for the Queen had
let the reins of government fall from her hands as she concentrated upon other matters.
Like Lancelot.
Lancelot and the Queen were lovers. For all Merlin’s watchful care, matters had trickled through his fingers like a handful
of springwater, leaving Merlin in control of nothing. As the hours turned to days and then to weeks, and spring to summer’s
heat, they made no secret of their liaison. Though they had once welcomed Lancelot with open arms, the people of Camelot did
not love the Queen’s Champion now. If they did not resent Lancelot for his part in the Queen’s adultery, they resented him
for his tacit assumption of Arthur’s rightful place. It seemed to them as if Lancelot wished to reign in Camelot, but the
common people still loved their king, and daily hoped for his return.
If he had any sense, Merlin reflected broodingly, he’d find where the boy had gotten to, and go and fetch Arthur back. It
was the least he could do to mend matters after having been the one who brought Lancelot to Camelot in the first place.
But as much as the adventure tempted him, he dared not leave Camelot.
Mordred was coming. Merlin knew it. The winds told him. The trees, the hearthfire, the whole natural world reverberated with
the foreknowledge of Mordred’s arrival. If not this year, then soon, very soon.…
Merlin had hoped to have a natural lifetime to prepare, as Mordred grew from child to man, but it was not to be. He had forgotten
that Morgan’s child grew with magical speed. Mordred would be a grown man seven years after his birth—in fact, he must be
nearly grown even now. And once he had come into whatever dark power Mab intended to gift him with, he would be a formidable
foe of all that was good.
The very walls rebuked Merlin’s willful blindness. Here he’d sat, year after year, hoping for the best but unwilling to meddle
magically in human lives the way his great enemy was so fond of doing, and now it had all come down to this. The Queen an
adulteress, her Champion a joke, the King’s bastard son coming long before anyone expected that he would, Arthur lost somewhere
in the lands to the East.
All muddled, all gone awry, and no way for him to mend even those problems within reach. Guinevere would not see him. She’d
made it clear that she wanted no wizard’s counsel, and Merlin could not find it in his heart to blame her. He’d brought her
Lancelot, after all. Was it any wonder she no longer trusted him?
Merlin left the castle, hoping a walk in the evening air would clear his thoughts. He made his way slowly through the town.
Though many turned away from him, making the sign against ill-fortune and magic, there were as many more who greeted him cheerfully,
glad of a link with the Old Ways. There were fewer of them this year than last, and soon there would be none at all. Mab’s
power was waning as the people forgot her.
Did she know it?
Merlin was certain that she did. There was little that transpired in Britain that the Queen of the Old Ways did not know about
these days. Being forgotten was her greatest fear. Merlin was sure she knew exactly how the tides of belief ran across the
land. Who was winning. Who was losing.
What would she do?
He didn’t know. Though he was a wizard, Merlin had little taste for magic at the best of times. When he had steeled himself
to spy upon Mab with his magic, he’d had little luck. Tintagel was hidden from him behind a shroud of magical mist, and even
Merlin could not see into the Land of Magic. He could only guess, from what he knew of Mab, that she would be plotting some
elaborate revenge upon all who had disappointed her, and that Mordred must be a part of it.
Despite his broodings, Merlin’s feet had brought him to the shore of the lake below Camelot. It was a perfect jewel, nearly
as beautiful as the Lake of Magic itself. The River Astolat came from the far north to fill its deep basin, and from it drained
three other rivers that nourished the whole of Britain with their waters. The lakeshore was a beautiful, peaceful setting,
and the sight of it calmed Merlin.
He told himself that the strength of his anxiety came as much from living within stone walls as from any action of the Queen’s.
It was only the childish fear of imprisonment, first triggered when he’d journeyed to the subterranean Land of Magic as a
boy, then intensified by his near-fatal captivity in Vortigern’s dungeons, that turned his thoughts and mood so dark. It was
not too late to change the events he dreaded. The matter of the Queen’s lover could still be mended. He would send Lancelot
home to Joyous Gard—to his wife—and in his absence the people would forgive their Queen. And once matters had been so settled
and Camelot was at peace again, he would go in search of Arthur and bring him home. Let others search for the Grail. A king’s
place was with his people, no matter what his heart told him. And with Arthur and Excalibur at Camelot, what real harm could
Mordred do?
Then Merlin could return to his beloved forest, away from the stone walls and roofs that so oppressed his spirit. Perhaps
his aversion was linked in some way to his magic, but though Merlin would gladly cast off his magic, he would never be willing
to give up his beloved wild places.
They were still there, he told himself. He drew a deep breath, trying to draw strength from that knowledge. The great trees
of Britain, the magnificent forests, could not be harmed by the petty intrigues of the Queen and court. They awaited him still.
And he would rejoin them soon.
Merlin felt the aura of gloom that had possessed him ever since the spring begin to lift, and as it did, far out across the
water, Merlin saw a spark of light.
It was dim at first. He was not sure what he saw. But as the sun set and the blue shadows lengthened across the water, the
small sparks in the distance became more distinct. A boat.
It was a barge, really, carved of a dark silvery wood like none found anywhere in Britain. Torches burned within it, and Merlin
could see the bulky shape of its cargo, but no human figure sitting or standing within it. The craft was redolent of magic,
and without wanting to, Merlin suddenly knew where it had come from and what cargo it bore.
And a moment ago, he had thought things would turn out all right.
Merlin turned and ran toward the castle, toward the Queen’s chambers, as if in his flight he could outpace this new knowledge,
could outrun both it and its dire tragic consequences. Breathless, he reached the doors of Guinevere’s rooms and flung them
open.
As he had known would be the case, there was no one in the room but the Queen and her Champion. The two of them stood close
together, their heads bowed over their clasped hands, oblivious to anything outside themselves.
“I warned you—but you wouldn’t listen!” Merlin cried in frustration and anger.
The lovers looked up in surprise at his unruly entrance, but even now they did not move away from one another. It was as if
it did not matter to them who saw them together.
“What’s happened?” Lancelot said finally.
“Did you think your reckless folly harmed no one?” Merlin said furiously. “Come and see the price another has paid for your
actions, Sir Lancelot!”
The Queen followed Lancelot and Merlin down to the shore of the twilit lake. The funeral barge had drifted closer to the shore.
Its curled prow was painted gold, and the hull had been filled with flowers. In their midst, on a raised dais draped with
rich fabrics, a woman lay as if asleep. She wore a golden tiara and was dressed in queenly robes. Lighted candles flickered
at each side of her head, to light her way into the land of Death.
“Elaine,” Lancelot whispered, as if he had only just remembered his wife’s existence.
Merlin waded out into the shallows to intercept the ship, and Lancelot followed him. Between them they pulled it toward the
shore, where it rested quietly in the reeds.
“How did she die?” Lancelot asked, standing in the water looking down at the still face of his wife.
There was a golden plaque inset into the surface of the bier at Elaine’s head:
“Here lies the Lady Elaine of Astolat, whose kind and generous heart was wounded to breaking by the indifference of one she
loved.”
“She died of a broken heart,” Merlin said softly. He had met the Lady Elaine only once, but surely she deserved better of
knowing him than this? Was everything he did so doomed, that Elaine, like the Lady Igraine before her, should die just because
he had come into her life? The thought was terrifying. He was Mab’s creation—did that mean that everything he did was to be
tainted with her evil?
“It was because of you,” Merlin said, more harshly than he wished to.
It is your fault, Sir Lancelot, not mine. Yours the sin, and yours the blame. Not mine—not mine!
Lancelot groaned aloud, staggering away from the boat and the sight of his dead wife as though he’d been dealt a mortal wound.
He slogged toward the shore, only to stop short at the sight of Guinevere.
He raised a hand and let it fall again without touching her. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. Then he lowered his head and strode
past her, shutting her out of his life.
Guinevere stared after him, only slowly realizing that Lancelot intended to leave her with no more word than that. She turned
back to Merlin, her eyes narrow with fury.
“Well, wizard?” she said angrily. “Happy now? You must despise love, if the sight of it causes you so much pain that you must
always destroy it!” She gathered up her skirts and followed after Lancelot.
Merlin stood in the water beside the boat, his sodden robes chilling him and weighing him down, though not as much as his
own thoughts. He gazed after the lovers.
I judged them too harshly,
he thought.
The guilt is mine as well—I picked Lancelot, after all. I wish I had told them that instead of shouting at them. It might
have made this easier.
The lake was cold, and the last rays of twilight were fading. Merlin shook his head sadly as he waded to shore. A flick of
his fingers sent magic to guide Elaine’s funeral barge on its interrupted journey again. He stood on the shore and watched
after it until it had disappeared into the evening mist, then began to walk slowly along the shore, toward his little hut
at the edge of the village. His wet robes flapped around his legs, but he hardly noticed.
Oh, Arthur! Come back to us, I beg you! Without you we are truly lost.
Standing unseen and invisible in a corner of the courtyard, her eldritch finery covered by a cloak woven of black cobwebs,
Queen Mab watched as ostlers saddled Black Bayard, Lancelot’s destrier. Lancelot was leaving Camelot, and the Queen.
Mab was pleased with the way matters had turned out. Elaine’s death was an unexpected stroke of good fortune—all Mab had dared
to hope for was a tearful letter, or perhaps an angry visit. But Elaine was dead, and now his guilt and complicity would drive
Lancelot mad. Certainly his guilty conscience would destroy any vestige of good sense he possessed.
Lancelot, fully dressed in his armor and sword, came across the stableyard toward his stallion. If she listened now, Mab could
hear his thoughts. They were all of Galahad, his son, deserted and orphaned by Lancelot’s actions. All he thought of now was
getting home to the boy.
Let him hope in vain.
Mab spread her hands and fingers, and for a moment a blue tangle of energy seemed to stream between them. With a quick gesture
she flung the intangible cat’s-cradle toward Lancelot. It settled over his head and shoulders as he mounted Black Bayard,
but he gave no sign of having noticed it.
Now, Lancelot, you will seek Joyous Gard in vain, condemned to wander forever across the face of the Earth, until you stop
loving Arthur’s Queen
… Mab gloated.
Lancelot swung into Bayard’s saddle and urged the horse at a gentle trot through the gates of Camelot. No one but the stableboys
was there to see him go.
Mab laughed soundlessly as she disappeared.